Early show at the Vogue

Music Review

Jeff Napier

Southern Culture On The Skids
The Vogue
Saturday, May 20

On paper, the Vogue’s early 10 p.m. concert curfew — presumably to keep Saturday night mainstay “tease” on its schedule — doesn’t sound too bad, but Southern Culture On The Skids isn’t a band that has any business playing anytime before midnight. You need time to get good and drunk before you can properly enjoy a Southern Culture On The Skids show. You need to have talked shit, been taken down a notch or two and have fallen in love a time or two before you can be ready to experience what Southern Culture On The Skids has to offer.

Not that they only sound good when you’re drunk, that isn’t it. Saturday, they sounded as good as they ever do, breezing through swamp-a-billy classics like “Banana Pudding,” “’69 El Camino” and “Liquored Up and Lacquered Down” with Mary Huff and Dave Hartman keeping a nice dirty bottom thump going behind Rick Miller’s incredible guitar and lead vocals. They are all masters at what they do.